Why Photography Matters as Art as Never Before

by Michael Fried

From the late 1970s onward, serious art photography began to be made at large scale and for the wall. Michael Fried argues that this immediately compelled photographers to grapple with issues centering on the relationship between the photograph and the viewer standing before it that until then had been the province only of painting. Fried further demonstrates that certain philosophically deep problems—associated with notions of  theatricality, literalness, and objecthood, and touching on the role of original intention in artistic production, first discussed in his contro­versial essay “Art and Objecthood” (1967)—have come to the fore once again in recent photography. This means that the photo­graphic “ghetto” no longer exists; instead photography is at the cutting edge of contemporary art as never before. 

Among the photographers and video-makers whose work receives serious attention in this powerfully argued book are Jeff Wall, Hiroshi Sugimoto, Cindy Sherman, Thomas Struth, Thomas Ruff, Andreas Gursky, Luc Delahaye, Rineke Dijkstra, Patrick Faigenbaum, Roland Fischer, Thomas Demand, Candida Höfer, Beat Streuli, Philip-Lorca diCorcia, Douglas Gordon and Philippe Parreno, James Welling, and Bernd and Hilla Becher. Future discussions of the new art photography will have no choice but to take a stand for or against Fried’s conclusions.   

Genres: Photography, Art, Art History, Philosophy

420 pages, Hardcover

First published December 1, 2008

Reviews

[Megan Snyder-camp · Rating 3 out of 5]

turns out it's a huge deal whether they're looking at you from the photo, but that's about all I walked away with.

[Nuno Carvalho · Rating 3 out of 5]

repeating the same argument - to new subjects i.e photography since the 60 ´s....problems with the writing style also : "Il will say that..", "I have said that", "for the moment I can olnly say this", etc. Cf geoff dyer review. Notwithstanding, lovely reproductions from the best contemporary artists in photography ( the main reason I keep returning to its pages"

[Joseph Sales]

Browsed this book today in the National Gallery bookstore. He's a significantl figure in contemporary academic Art History,or probably more aptly, visual cultural studies. The plates were engrossing, I'll look at his analysis more deeply next time. Of course, it will be difficult to avoid comparing anything said with Sontag's brilliant précis.

[Jonathan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Beautifully produced with great reproductions. Catch up on art photography if nothing else. "Absorption and theatricality" again, applied to large art photographs meant from the beginning to hang on walls.